The Loss
by kaz456
Summary: The Animorphs knew they couldn't win all the time. And now they, or more specifically, one of them, is suffering the consequences of that loss.
1. Default Chapter

Disclaimer: KAA = owner of Animorphs. Me = owner of absolutely nothing.  

A/N: Okay, this first chapter is going to be a little confusing. I wanted it to have the appearance of being jumbled, frazzled thoughts, a mix of reality and memories. And yeah, it's pretty short too. But it's only short because it's the first chapter, and I like to have the first chapter be short. And lastly, the italics represent his memories. Please read and review at the end. Thanks!

_{Tobias!}_

I flew. I flew faster and harder than I had ever flown before, than I would ever fly again-  trying to fly away from everything. 

_{Tobias!} The bear swipes blindly at the masses of Hork-Bajir surrounding it, engulfing it. {Tobias, go!}_

_{Rachel!} _

I wasn't flying anymore; I was speeding. I was a speeding bullet, looking for a target to hit me and to wake me up from this nightmare.

_{Tobias, you have to leave.} _

It wouldn't end. I needed something to rid me of this hellish delusion, something to help me escape from this hallucination.

_{No!__ It's a trap! Everybody, get back!}_

_{It's too late, Tobias,} The tiger looks up at me, sounding grim, but knowing the truth. _

_{Guys, morph, do something, you've got to get away!}_

_{No.__ We will fight.} The Andalite straightens up, prepared to fight until the end._

The rain began to relentlessly pour down. Maybe it could wash away the pain, the ache, the thoughts. Why wasn't it ending? When would it be over? 

_{I finally have the Andalite Bandits!} The Visser crows. _

_{Tobias, there's still time. You have to go.}The wolf looks at me with always compassionate eyes. _

_{No...I can't….}_

The rain beat down on me, beating the hard facts into me. There was nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. I couldn't escape from the truth.

_{Tobias, go!} The tiger glares determinedly. _

_{Come, Andalites! I have waited for this day!}_

_{Tobias…if you can…someday…tell my dad, okay?} The gorilla also looks at me, serious for once._

The tree loomed up in front, unseen by me. I increased my speed, ready to crash into it and end it all. 

_{Tobias….I love you.}_

_{Rachel!}_

I veered suddenly away from the tree. I landed, and morphed to the human boy I once was. My tears blended with the rain until I couldn't tell the difference between the two. 

_{Rachel, I love you too! God, I love you!}_

"Leave me alone!" I shouted to the memories. They wouldn't stop coming, kept tumbling out, giving me no relief.

_{Tobias!}_

I closed my eyes. They were captured. All of them.

It had been a fateful battle. We should have known our luck wouldn't hold out. We should have known this would happen. We weren't invincible.

 By now they would be controllers. And I hadn't done anything. I had escaped, unharmed. I had run away. I had condemned my friends to a fate worse than death, the same fate that would inevitably befall me as well. The Yeerks knew who I was. They would be searching for me. I was hunted, an endangered species.

I didn't care.

I was alone, all alone. Again. Everything important to me was gone, captured, taken. And I hadn't done anything to prevent it.

I was a coward.  A disgrace.

And I was alone. 

I could see the faint outline of lightning. The rain poured down, drenching me in my guilt and cowardliness. What was there left for me? What was left for me to do?

I demorphed back into red-tailed hawk. I flew up to my tree. The only thing in my life that hadn't changed in the last few hours.

_{Tobias…}_

Lightning flashed, thunder roared, and the rain fell steadily, gradually reminding me of the pitiful reality of my life.  


	2. Chapter 1

A/N: Okay, I know this seems disorderly, and at times, repetitive. But these are Tobias' thought. They're not going to be structured and organized. I mean, put yourself in his place. How would you be thinking? Exactly.  
  
Disclaimer: Hers. All hers.  
  
What do you do? When life, twisted, distorted life, turns it's back on you, what do you do?  
  
If you're Rachel, you fight back. You turn around and fight back just as hard.  
  
If you're Ax, you realize your duty and fight back as well.  
  
If you're Cassie, you use peace and find a way to get life to turn back around and face you.  
  
If you're Jake, you order life to face you, and it'll obey.  
  
If you're Marco, you use your wits to get back at life.  
  
But I'm not Rachel or Ax or Cassie or Jake or Marco. I'm Tobias. What do you do if you're Tobias?  
  
If you're Tobias, you run away.  
  
That's what I was doing. Running away. Like the coward, the idiot, the person that I was. Not even a person. I was some messed-up mix of bird, human, and alien. A freak. A friendless freak. I wasn't even human, for God's sake.  


I remembered Rachel's voice, reassuring me.  
"Tobias, you are human. Nothing can change that. And when this war is over, you can be completely human."  
  
When this war is over....  
  
Wasn't this war over right now? Wasn't it all finished? What more was left? My friends were gone, and were now my enemies who knew practically everything about me.  
  
We had lost. Plain and simply, we had lost. That didn't justify why I was running away. But it was natural instinct. The hawk in me fled when it was scared. The human in me had always tried to do the same thing.  
  
And now it had come down to this.  
  
We had always thought of ourselves as invincible. Sure, we could get hurt, and we could endure a lot of pain, but a quick morph could fix all of it. We had never thought that we would go down so fast.  
  
Right now, the rest of them probably already had Yeerks in their heads, leaving them as slaves in their own bodies. And there was nothing I could do.  
  
They would be looking for me right now. And what was worse, they had all of my friend's memories and knowledge, so they would know where to find me.  
  
I had to get away. I had to run. I had to escape and throw them off guard.  
  
What could I do? There was no way that I was smarter or more intelligent that any of my friends. What could I do?  
  
"Tobias, you are human. Nothing can change that. And when this war is over, you can be completely human."  
  
Human.... Completely human....  
  
I knew what I could do.  
  
I spread my wings and let the wind lift me off my branch. I drifted east, towards the thicker area of the woods.  
  
Towards where I had last seen campers.  
  
There they were. Two guys, two girls, all hanging around and laughing. Friends.  
  
I dove down and landed on the one guy. His DNA would soon be mine "Whoa!" He cried out.  
  
"Oh my god, it's, like, a psycho bird," One of the girls commented.  
  
"Get it off me!" The same guy yelled, trying to flap me off.   
  
It was reckless. It was wrong. But now wasn't the time to sit around, and it wasn't the time to moralize.  
  
When I was done acquiring him, I flew away. I flew away from my meadow forever, without looking back. What was left there for me anyways? Whatever was there, I wouldn't need it anymore.  
  
I landed softly on the floor of a clearing. Took one, last, look through my hawk eyes. The hawk's body had been my own for so long. Was I really going to do this?  
  
I concentrated on something I had seen Ax do so long ago. I blended my human body and the guy's DNA to form a completely different person. All it would take would be two hours, and then I would be safe from my friends- turned-enemies. Only two hours.  
  
How ironic. The boy who got stuck in morph as a bird regained his morphing powers and used them to only get willingly trapped as a human. Not even the human I was once, either.  
  
Two hours later, I was human. Not hawk any more, just human and alien.  
  
I stood up, and looked around with my dim human eyes. Stretched my fingers. I would never again fly. Never again see with the clearness of Red-Tailed Hawk's eyes. Never again spread my wings.  
  
I was human. Rachel would be happy.  
  
She wasn't happy now.  
  
Neither was I.  
  
And that was when I did my first act in my brand-new, forever mine, human body. I sat down in the clearing and cried. 


End file.
